The NCAA tournament is exciting and full of hype, the NIT is neither. I HATE it when people say that the NIT champion is the "66th best team" though, and people say it all the time.
My team is NC State and we were also picked to finish 12th in our conference in preseason. (Of course, there are only 12 teams in the ACC). It was fun to play a few games in the NIT because we were playing our best bball in the postseason, and it really builds some hope for the future. Congrats to you two WVU fans, that was a fun game.
Morgantown was a tough place to play for your Wolfpack, but you made a great game of it.